In this fast-paced murder mystery, Detective Joe Zuma returns from his vacation in Cape Code, with his wife, Claudia, a landscape painter, who finds employment as an art teacher in a private school in Santa Monica. Zuma is immediately confronted with the murder of two women, one of whom was a teacher at the same school Claudia is now working in. A parent at the private school is eager to have Claudia work with her child who is depressed. Zuma recognizes the parent as the murder suspect from an earlier crime which Zuma had been unable to secure enough evidence for a trial. Claudia's painting interests are captured by the hobos who live on the bluffs in Santa Monica, an area adjacent to the Pacific Ocean. Her painting of a hobo is stolen, and its investigation leads to the uncovering of drug-selling connections between the hobo, his very rich and successful brother, the murdered teacher and her German-speaking parents, a principal and students, a homeless woman, as well as the murders of three of these characters. Interspersed between the solving of these murders is the romantic bantering of Claudia and the Bob Dylan-loving Zuma and their genuine love. The resolution to the previously unsolved murder involves the transformation of Zuma from a single-minded pursuit of justice to a delicate balancing of justice and mercy.